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Dream.Build.Play 2009 Winners Announced

Microsoft revealed the winners of its 2009 Dream.Build.Play Challenge, which encourages independent and hobbyist game developers to create fun and innovative video games for Xbox 360 using XNA Game Studio, each taking home their share of the $75,000 price money.

Four winners received a share of $75,000 in cash prizes and could have the opportunity to publish their games on Xbox LIVE Arcade.

This year’s global Dream.Build.Play Challenge garnered over 350 games from more than 100 countries. Those who participated in the contest, and are located in a supported region, will have the opportunity to publish their games on the Xbox LIVE Indie Games Channel.

Dean Dodrill of the United States earned the grand prize of $40,000 for “Dust: An Elysian Tail” a side-scrolling, action role-playing game in which the player controls Dust, a man searching for himself. Set in the beautiful yet mysterious world of Falana, this game chronicles Dust’s journey to liberate an oppressed village and rediscover his past. Meticulously hand-animated and painted, “Dust: An Elysian Tail” welcomes exploration, action, and above all else, mastery of a fighting system that rewards skilled gamers.

Panya Inversin and his team from the United States took home second place and $20,000 for their stunning 3-D, four-player brawler/space-shooter, “Max Blastronaut”.

Nivel21 Entertainment, led by Mauricio Garcia from Spain, received third place and $10,000 for the challenging puzzle game “Rotor’scope – The Secret of the Endless Energy”.

China’s Hu Ling and his team came in fourth place and received $5,000 for the stylish martial arts action game “HurricaneX2 Evolution”.

“Once again, the community of indie developers has blown us away with the quality of games submitted to Dream.Build.Play this year,” XNA General Manager Boyd Multerer said. “Beyond the creative talent unleashed with XNA Game Studio, it’s great to see Xbox LIVE Indie Games coming into its own as the home for independent console games.”

Earlier this year, Microsoft released the next iteration of its industry-leading game development toolset, XNA Game Studio 3.1. By building on the momentum of XNA Game Studio 3.0, which made it easier for developers of all levels to build great games, this update takes full advantage of new Xbox LIVE features and strong existing partnerships. With XNA Game Studio 3.1, developers are able to add support for customized Avatars and enables support for Xbox LIVE Parties. XNA Game Studio 3.1 also benefits from improvements and new partner product support from Synapse Gaming with their SunBurn products, Toon Boom Animation Inc. with their product Toon Boom Studio, and Autodesk with the Softimage 7.5 Mod Tool.